Book Signing - Diana Gabaldon
Chris and I went to see Diana Gabaldon last night at The Poisoned Pen in downtown Phoenix. The event was scheduled to start at 6:30 and Gabaldon was scheduled to talk at 7 before signing everyone's books.
When we got there a little after 6:30, there were two cops directing traffic and lots and lots of cars. When we got inside, we found it was standing room only and Gabaldon was already doing an informal Q&A before her official talk. She gave us a little background on how she got started, a few stories about various interviews she's done and read an excerpt from the new book, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. They cut her off a little early since there were so many people there (they actually had to turn people away).
They were going to take people into the signing line by number. We had a small problem, we had no number and couldn't see where to get one. Chris did some recon and found that our pre-ordered books were at will call so we just figured we had to wait until the end. Since there were probably 300 people there, it looked to be a while.
We passed the time looking at the art in the Bentley Gallery which is attached to the book store. If you're in the market for big pieces of art that look like someone randomly threw paint on them and that cost $50,000 and up, it was your kind of place.
I also checked out the crowd. Women of all ages with the average age looking to be around 40 but the range was from 20 to 60+. A smattering of men, almost all of whom looked to be attached to a woman. Everyone looked pretty excited to be there.
They finally got to the last of the numbers around 8:45 so we got in at the end of the line. When we got close enough to see the books on hold, Chris went over and tried to get ours. They said we'd get them off the signing table but gave her the receipt. There was a number printed on it - 36. Hmmm, guess we should have gotten that receipt first. That's just the way things seem to go.
We finally got up to the table after watching Gabaldon graciously sign and pose for pictures with folks. I told her, "We used to be booksellers and we thought your books were romance but we were wrong." She made a face when I said romance. Chris said, "I hope you're going to be nicer to Roger in this book." Gabaldon just said, "You'll have to read it and see." We interpreted the look she gave when she said it that it doesn't bode well for poor Roger.
So, now I have a new 980 page book and still have the close to 1,000 page one before that to get through. If no one sees me for a week or so, you'll know I'm housebound and reading.
